KOCHI: Thiruvabharanam, the sacred gold ornaments adorned by deities on special occasions, are kept wrapped in plastic covers and stored inside boxes in the strongrooms of the Travancore Devaswom Board without adequate security, a report by the Thiruvabharanam commissioner has said.
“Many ornaments are kept in plastic covers, which are placed inside old wooden boxes and, in some places, iron boxes. The register numbers are often difficult to read and several articles are stored together in the same box,” said the report, filed on a directive of the Kerala High Court to suggest measures for improving the security, conservation, storage and transfer of the ornaments in devaswoms under the TDB.
The commissioner also said a considerable quantity of gold and silver articles kept in the strongrooms had become unusable for pooja or festivals due to age, damage, breakage or other causes.
He said these occupy a substantial storage space and require extra time and effort for identification, counting and verification every time inventorying is done.
“A consideration may be given from time to time to convert gold and silver articles, which are unusable and incapable of restoration, into bars,” the commissioner said, adding that a uniform and scientific system for the security, conservation, storage, transfer and documentation of the sacred ornaments was the need of the hour.
Steps suggested
A digital database should be prepared for each Thiruvabharanam. It should include a unique asset number, the name of the group, subgroup and devaswom, weight, type of metal, number of gemstones and transfer history.
Each Thiruvabharanam should be stored separately in transparent, chemical-resistant pouches of archival quality.
Several Thiruvabharanam pouches belonging to the same devaswom may be stored in specially-designed trays made of stainless steel or aluminium. A list of the ornaments in each tray should be recorded and a QR code/RFID system provided.
Inside strongrooms, stainless-steel modular locker cabinets should be installed and each cabinet should contain separately numbered compartments, each arranged to hold only the trays belonging to designated devaswoms.
Instead of the wooden boxes and plastic covers, archival-quality non-reactive pouches, acid-free cushioned containers, fire-resistant metal trays and 304-grade stainless-steel cabinets should be used.
